India will make 50 essential drugs available free of charge

Fifty essential drugs are to be made available to the entire population of India free of charge, the Indian government has announced.

The government argues that the list of 50 drugs will be sufficient to deal with three quarters of most people’s medical needs and will enable it to negotiate pricing deals during procurement and provide more than a third more drugs for the same amount of money. The list includes analgesics, antibiotics, antihypertensives, and antidiabetes drugs.

The initiative will be implemented in selected Indian hospitals initially …